This is a renewal application for our existing, very successful and productive Alcohol Research Center Grant. The Alcohol Research Center proposal entitled "Alcohol, HIV Infection and Host Defense", is a coordinated effort on the part of a group of active, independent, original scientists to combined their intellectual and physical resources into an alcohol center of excellence that serves as a regional and national resource in the field of alcohol-related research, training, education and dissemination of information. The major foci of our research efforts in the second five years of existence of the Alcohol Research Center include the effects of alcohol on SIV (as a model of HIV) infection and secondary infections, the interactions between alcohol and HIV proteins, and the brain as a site of alcohol, HIV, and nitric oxide interaction. The Alcohol Research Center Grant proposal consists of the following parts: Administrative Core Unit, Animal Core Unit, Molecular/Cellular Biology Laboratory Core unit, four Research Components (" Alcohol, Simian Immunodeficiency Virus and Host Defense", HIV/SIV and Hepatic Immune System in Alcoholics", "Alcohol, HIV-1 Proteins and AZT Therapy", "Alcohol Potentiation of AIDS Neuropathy") and a Pilot Component Unit. A wide range of research training opportunities for students and faculty, as well as mechanisms for transfer and dissemination of information re also integral parts of the Alcohol Research Center. In addition to LSU Medical Center, the Regional Primate Center in Covington plays a major role in the proposed work involving primates. One of the research components will be largely performed at the Ochsner Medical Foundation. Several faculty members and some students of Xavier University, a predominantly under- represented minority institution, will be participants in some of the research as well as educational activities that are proposed.